Historic Logging and Milling Photos

[Ron Scott]

Logging of Long-Gone Days

http://gowood.blogspot.com/2015/08/logging-of-long-gone-days.html

[beenthere]

Very interesting to watch and wonder just how they "took the heat" and the hard work. But they did and we built a lot of things with the wood they produced.

[snowstorm]

Logging of Long-Gone Days

http://gowood.blogspot.com/2015/08/logging-of-long-gone-days.html

ralph stanley any chance he is from mount dersert island maine? he is a fiddle player but is more well known for building wooden boats. downeast lobster boats and yachts. just wounder if he is the ralph stanley that made the video

[dnalley]

I believe this Ralph Stanley is the one from bluegras-mountain music fame that's playing the great music in the slideshow.  I know he's a great banjo player, don't know about the fiddle, altho a lot of his kind can play 'bout anything with strings on it.  May be another Ralph Stanley who made this, whatever I really appreciate the posting.  I think those men were cut from tougher material than I was.  Makes me think of some stories I've heard my daddy tell.  How did they stack those logs so HIGH ?  I wouldn't climb up there if they gave me the logs, the slide, and the horses to boot!  Nothing but respect for them.  How many of us would  make it these days if it was still that rough... but I don'the know, maybe it still is in lots of places.  Thanks for the video.

[SwampDonkey]

Strap on a brush saw/clearing saw for a 40 hr week and you'll find out. And not on nice ground but hills, rocks and logging residue to climb around. That should be enough. :D

[beenthere]

SD
Don't think even that would be half what they were doing... and another vid showing the logging in the Cypress swamps where the heat was what we today think is unbearable.

Not sayin your 40 hour isn't above and beyond...  ;)

[AK Newbie]

Enjoyed the video, thanks for sharing!

[Magicman]

Thanks Ron, some of those pictures showed some ingenuity and without pictures, unbelievable.

[SwampDonkey]

I forgot to mention I liked those old photos to. The music wasn't too bad neither.  8) ;D

[Just Me]

Very interesting pictures! Thanks to all.

I lived out in Montana in the late 60's/early 70's and it was not uncommon at that time to see one log loads. Three log loads were the norm. They would push 6' diameter trees off to the side to get them out of the way and leave them, too small. I went back to the areas I lived in at the time, Kalispell/Missoula, and there are no big trees left thirtyfive years later.

Larry

[SwampDonkey]

Nope, not for another 400. ;)

[caveman]

I don't know if this has been posted on the Forestry Forum previously but this is a video of the last train load of cypress harvested and milled by Cummer and Son's cypress in Lacoochee, Fl.  My great grandfather on my mother's side was a railroad man who lived in Lacoochee.  One of my uncles, who died last year at around 93 years old retired from Seaboard Coastline as an engineer but as a young man, he fed wood to feed steam powered engines.  Anyway, I heard from one of my cousins that my Uncle Bud had a video tape of this last train of cypress but no one in the family I asked could come up with it.  My dad found it on Youtube.  The picture quality is not too good but I was glad to find it nonetheless.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FgRuCJmI_XI&t=1892s

[Chuck White]

Some of those pictures reminded me of the way they did it here in the Adirondack Mountains of New York!

That's especially true when using the horses!   It's a marvel as to what a team of horses can move!!!!

My Maternal Grandfather was born in one of the lumber camps here in the Adirondacks and had many stories to tell about growing up there!

Great Video/pics, thanks for posting!

[SwampDonkey]

Yes, for sure about the horses, sometimes two teams hitch to a load. But logging was the main reason for a rail road in these parts. Most of it all abandoned now, but it also helped settle the country moving animals and freight up the river valley.

Enjoyed the cypress logging video caveman.  You couldn't complain too much when you had a job. A lot of those old timers lived a long life, so physical work never hurt them, it was often the hazards of the job that shortened the life span of a few or made it difficult.

[WDH]

Very interesting.  Thank you, Kyle.

[Magicman]

Thank You for that video.  Those were some lonesome mournful sounds at the end of a long lost era.

[WV Sawmiller]

   Very interesting video. I loved the early shots of the loggers wading out through the swamps to get to the work area. I know I would not want to be wait to chest deep in gator and moccasin infested water, cypress knees and water bonnets to pull a cross cut saw. I remember my grandfather talking about girdling cypress near there. They'd girdle the  trees so they'd die on the stump and float out easier. He'd have to notch the tree root "flares" build a scaffold to stand on then when finished he'd carve or stamp his initials in the tree so they knew who to pay. I think he got 10 cents per tree.

[caveman]

JMoore and I went and got some live oak logs this morning near the Withlacoochee River, which is about 15 minutes from my house.  I used to fish and canoe in that river quite a bit several years ago.  There are still a few of the big ones left in there. Some of the enormous cypress stumps remain and are rotting from the inside out.  A few of the scaffold board notches are still visible in some of them.

There are still plenty of big gators and moccasins in that river.  The place where we got the logs this morning has an old Cracker style cypress house on it that flooded during Irma.  The owners are going to build another house since mold has evidently made the old house uninhabitable. 

[newoodguy78]

Den

If you look in the backrground of your first picture, you can see how they used to skid those big logs out by horsepower.  There is a really nifty skid trail consisting of split rails.  They used to grease those up so that horses could skid them to a landing.  Then loaded onto a railcar.  It also seems that they used to use the drainage areas ... ie the streams.
Williamsport, PA was the lumber capital of the world in 1850.  My, how times have changed.  They used to have mills that produced 250 MMbf of lumber per year.  30 Mbf/day was the norm for edging strrips that were turned into kindling for the New York City markets.  Most modern mills in our area don't produce that much.

I sit back in awe to see what they used to do 100 years ago as compared to what we can do with our "modernaization".   Our mills are smaller, and where we can log is limited by mechanics.  I used to mark timber to an area where guys could drag a winch line to.  Then I would go up slope another 100 yds. and find a charcoal flat.

One thing to keep in mind that the best production for a shift was set in New Hampshire around 1910 (I believe).  Over 100 Mbf in a shift (12 hrs).

Ron,
Do you or anyone else know if this production record stands or was that a record for that period in history? That's a massive amount of lumber. And also do you know at what mill and where in New Hampshire it was?

Being a New Hampshire native and having a great grandfather that worked in the lumbercamps and sawmills of New Hampshire this caught my eye.
I know this quote goes back aways but I enjoy when these older threads resurface. It's hard to comprehend all the info buried back in this forum.
Thanks in advance for any info you might have

[WDH]

Some of the big pine mills in the South are producing 250 MMBF per year. 

[newoodguy78]

Is that mostly being cut for the pressure treated market?

[Ianab]

Some of the big pine mills in the South are producing 250 MMBF per year.

I can believe that. The new Red Stag mill near Napier here in NZ cuts (if my conversion maths is right) about 220 MMBF, and is boasted as the largest mill in the Southern Hemisphere. Which means there are larger ones Nth of the Equator, probably the ones you are thinking of.

To put that into perspective, that's 8,000 logs per DAY, and the sorting machine is handling 90 boards a minute. Puts our portable sawmills to shame.  :D

Product is all grade from premium clear pine to fence posts, and the wood waste powers the drying kilns.

[SwampDonkey]

At St Leonard, Irving is producing 340 MMBF per year of SPF lumber and 40 MMBF of hardwood lumber at their Veneer Sawmill there.

At their new Ashland , Maine mill they produce 130 MMBF of 2 x material 6-12' length.

Their Grand Lake mill does 230 MMBF.

Sussex does 120 MMBF, but that mill is their proving grounds, so to speak. They implement the most up to date technology there and probably their best people.

These are all Irving, and they have more mills not listed.

Their waste is hog fuel and pulp material.

[WDH]

Jake (Customsawyer) saws at what is purported to be the largest hardwood sawmill in the US.  They use 150 to 175 tractor trailer loads of logs per day.  That is 4000 to 5000 tons/day. 

[dgdrls]

Some Canadian Archival shots.



  



 


Loggers squaring a pine at Jocko River, Ontario, 1890

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